Main menu

Tag Archives: road reconstruction

Post navigation

The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation will start or continue several major projects on local roads and bridges this year as it spends an estimated $272 million to give drivers a smoother, safer ride.

There will be plenty of inconvenience on the way in District 11, which includes Allegheny Beaver and Lawrence counties. PennDOT officials at a briefing this morning stressed the importance of safe driving, including adhering to work zone speed limits.

Specific announcements of road and bridge closures or restrictions will come as the events draw nearer, officials said.

The McDade Expressway in Scranton, Route 924 in Hazleton and a long stretch of Route 29 in Susquehanna and Wyoming counties are among area roads the state Department of Transportation has targeted for repaving this year.

The three heavily traveled routes are among 28 stretches of road in six Northeast Pennsylvania counties that PennDOT officials plan for routine resurfacing work this year. They’ll pay for it with new transportation funding from higher fees and gradually increasing gas taxes.

“PennDOT will be resurfacing about 110 miles of road this year,” agency spokesman James May said. “If we didn’t have Act 89, the number would be zero.”

Act 89 is the $2.3 billion transportation funding package the state Legislature approved in late 2013. PennDOT did have work on several larger capital pro­jects planned regardless, like the ongoing Keyser Avenue project in Scranton.

NORRISTOWN ­­— A groundbreaking ceremony for the first contract to extend Lafayette Street into Plymouth and widen it to four lanes will be held at 2 p.m. Monday at Ford and Lafayette streets.

The $11.5 million contract with Allan A. Myers Inc. of Worcester will extend the existing Lafayette Street from Ford Street to Conshohocken Road. The 0.6-mile extension will have two lanes in each direction and a 12-foot landscaped median in the center.

“We are building a new road bridge over Ross Street for Lafayette Street. Ross Street is where the Schuylkill River Trail crosses under the Norfolk Southern railway bridge,” said Leo Bagley, the assistant director of the Montgomery County Planning Commission. “We are building a noise wall from Ross Street toward Conshohocken Road to protect the residences on Ross Street and Chestnut Street in Plymouth.”

The Schuylkill River Trail will be relocated and rebuilt next to the Lafayette Street extension, where it will serve as a sidewalk for the roadway. Trail users around the Ross Street crossing may be affected by limited closures for bridge work.